In what direction may one turn with any hope of finding even the aspiration for such an aristocracy? Only there where a _noble_ attitude of mind prevails, an attitude of mind which believes in slavery and in manifold orders of rank, as the prerequisites of any higher degree of culture. Men with this attitude of mind will insistently call for, and will at last produce, philosophical men of power, artist-tyrants,--a higher kind of men which, thanks to their preponderance of will, knowledge, riches, and influence, will avail themselves of democratic Europe as the most suitable and subtle instrument for taking the fate of Europe into their hands, and working as artists upon man himself. The fundamental belief of these great desirers will be that society must not be allowed to exist for its own sake, but only as the foundation and scaffolding by means of which a select class of beings may be able to elevate themselves to their highest duties, and in general to a higher existence: like those sun-climbing plants in Java which encircle an oak so long and so often with their arms that at last, high above it, but supported by it, they can unfold their tops in the open light, and exhibit their happiness.[258] 12 _Signs of Ascent_ Are we moving toward such a consummation? Can we detect about us any signs of this ascending movement of life? Not signs of “progress”; that is another narcotic, like Christianity,--good for slaves, but to be avoided by those who rule. Man as a species is not progressing; the general level of the species is not raised. But humanity as mass sacrificed to the prosperity of the one stronger type of Man,--that _would be_ a progress.[259] Progress of this kind, to some degree, there has always been. The ruling class in Greece, as seen in Homer and even in Thucydides (though with Socrates degeneration begins), is an example of this kind of progress or attainment. Imagine this culture, which has its poet in Sophocles, its statesman in Pericles, its physician in Hippocrates, its natural philosopher in Democritus; here is a yea-saying, a gratitude, to life in all its manifestations; here life is understood, and covered with art that it may be borne; here men are frivolous so that they may forget for a moment the arduousness and perilousness of their task; they are superficial, but from profundity; they exalt philosophers who preach moderation, because they themselves are so immoderate, so instinctive, so hilariously wild; they are great, they are elevated above any ruling class before or after them because here the morals of the governing caste have grown up among the governing caste, and not among the herd.[260]